The Rotary Forge

Sammanfattning:

Needs for cost reduction in military and civil production of large tubes led to the development of the new manufacturing processes. Large losses in production of large-caliber cannons and other tubes forced factories to develop and apply manufacturing processes that permit fabrication of parts closer to required net shape.
The state-of-the-art improvement in technology is made possible through a major change in forging methods for large, hollow, high-strength steel alloys by use of a rotary forge machine developed by the Austrian firm GFM. The machine was capable of both hot and cold forging of hollow or solid cylinders having maximum starting diameters of 22 inches and a minimum hole size of 2.5 inches and will forge cannon tubes up to a maximum length of 33 feet.

Needs for cost reduction in military and civil production of large tubes led to the development of the new
manufacturing processes. Large losses in production of large-caliber cannons and other tubes forced factories
to develop and apply manufacturing processes that permit fabrication of parts closer to required net shape.

The state-of-the-art improvement in technology is made possible through a major change in forging methods for large,
hollow, high-strength steel alloys by use of a rotary forge machine developed by the Austrian firm GFM
(Geselschaft für Fertigungstechink und Maschinebau AG).

The machine was capable of both hot and cold forging of hollow or solid cylinders having maximum starting diameters
of 22 inches and a minimum hole size of 2.5 inches and will forge cannon tubes up to a maximum length of 33 feet.
It was the largest machine of its kind - 195 feet long and weighing 935 tons.

The machine was located in the USA. This machine has a self-contained forging box in which the work piece is formed by
four forging hammers that are axially symmetric and synchronized in such a way that rotational motion of the work piece
is interrupted to permit hammer-to-metal contact while the work piece is immobile in order to avoid shearing or surface
tearing of the forging. The forging hammers are mechanically driven, generating a maximum force of 1100 tons per hammer.
The reaction forces are absorbed in the forging box and are not transmitted to the foundation as with conventional
open-die forge presses. This results in a significant reduction in noise level with the foundation remaining vibration-free.

The complete forging sequence, including loading and unloading, is accomplished through use of a numerical control system.
This provides a greater dimensional precision than is possible with conventional forging presses, as the latter are
completely operator-skill dependent. With the use of a mandrel device on the machine, the cannon tube is forged with
the proper size hole for subsequent finishing operations. Cannon tubes cannot be hot formed as hollows with open-die
press forging methods.

Machine has two large chuck-jaw heads on each side of the forging box. Initially, the work piece is held by only one
chuck-jaw. As forging proceeds, the chuck-jaw on the opposite side of the forging box picks up the partially completed
forging and finally supports it entirely as the forging is completed. This permits cannon tube forging to be worked its
full length in a single pass with minimum material loss.

Practice showed that material losses in rotary forge are around 8 times less then in conventional practice. It should be
noted that "loss" does not imply discarding all the material, as most of it is remelted and recast to produce additional
cannon tubes or other items. Since that rotary forge process begins with a hollow work piece that will be obtained from
an electroslag refined (ESR) cast ingot, the material loss is markedly less than that for the conventional process.

In order to obtain an evolution of how well the rotary forge operation is controlled, the tolerances achieved during hot
forging were measured. Wall thickness variation ranged between 0.044 to 0.060 inch. The repeatability was excellent since
that machine is numerically controlled. To place these values in proper perspective, it should be realized that tolerances
maintained for the conventional forging practice are achieved as a consequence of subsequent machining operations which
include finish turning the external surface and then trepanning the hole in the solid forging. Rotary-forged internal
diameter variations are small and less than one-half of those resulting from conventional practice.

Since that these methods were used also for production of cannon weapons, where the principal concern are material
characteristics of the high-strength steel alloys employed, the influence of the rotary forge process on the material
properties was an important consideration. A comparison was made of the properties obtained after heat treatment from
conventional and rotary forged tubes for cannons. The mechanical property variations from tube to tube and also within
a tube along its length have been determined. It would appear that there is a tendency for the rotary-forged material to
display somewhat more uniform mechanical properties. It is equally apparent that the toughness values are consistently
higher, and that, too, is beneficial since a greater toughness is associated with a higher fatigue life limit.

Experiments also were conducted to evaluate the cold forging operational capabilities of this rotary forging machine.
It has been done in a single pass reduction of 17 per cent. In this case, the mandrel over which material was formed
contained a mirror image of the desired geometry and the proper helix angle of rifling. The rifling form dimensions
and tolerances were equal or better than those achieved by conventional rifling practice. In addition, the bore surface
finish was better than that achieved through standard practice. The external finish obtained would be adequate with no
further machining required as there are no detrimental surface discontinuities.

Tests were also conducted to determine feasibility of cold forging thick wall cannon tubes. Full size howitzer tubes
were successfully cold forged from materials having initial yield strength of 176 ksi (12 bar). This was accomplished
in a single pass with an average reduction of 15 per cent. The transverse yield strength is of most importance because
the maximum firing stresses are operable in the transverse (hoop) direction. The cannon tube material specification
requirements for yield strength and ductility have been met.

However, the toughness values achieved were only marginal and somewhat below specifications requirements. Additional
work is required in terms of tooling optimization, thermal treatment, and the amount of metal flow required in order
to achieve satisfactory mechanical properties throughout the finished cannon tube.

It is obvious that tremendous economic advantages and benefits can be derived from both hot and cold forging of
cannon tubes. From the hot-forging application alone, it has been showed that costs of cannon tube forging was reduced
by 50 per cent using this process. In the cold forging applications for thin wall tubes, where the rifling can be put
in as part of the forming process, reductions of up to 40 per cent in fabrication times were achieved. There are also
significant reductions possible in finishing operations of all large diameter and cannon tubes using the machine in
the cold-forging mode, and such reductions reflected at lower costs.

Sök i kunskapsbasen

The Total Materia database contains many thousands of forging materials across a large range of countries and standards.

Where available, full property information can be viewed for materials including chemical composition, mechanical properties, physical properties, advanced property data and much more.

Using the Advanced Search page, it is possible to search for materials by their key descriptive words detailed in the standard title by using the Standard Description function of Advanced Search.

It maybe that you need to further narrow the search criteria by using the other fields in the Advanced Search page e.g. Country/Standard.

Then click Submit.

A list of materials will then be generated for you to choose from.

After clicking a material from the resulting list, a list of subgroups derived from standard specifications appears.

From here it is possible to view specific property data for the selected material and also to view similar and equivalent materials in our powerful cross reference tables.

For example, by clicking on the mechanical properties link on the subgroup page it is possible to view mechanical properties data for the material including yield stress, tensile stress, elongation and impact data.